Quote:
Originally Posted by IndyNorm
I could be misremembering, but most of us Ballard detractors (at least the sane ones) didn't really sour on him until the shit show that was the 2022 season. Not to say that we didn't criticize some of his moves (pretty sure I wasn't happy w/ all of the trading down and a loft of thee selections of the '19 draft for example), but for the most part we were all pretty happy w/ Ballard at least through the 2020 season.
And yes, Ballard is a MUCH better FM than Grigson. But that's not saying much considering my dog probably would have been a better GM for the Colts than Grigson was.
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I was high on him when first hired. I was also on board with the Nelson selection and the win from the inside out mantra. I was on board as we were building the "Run the Damn Ball" physical domination psyche. Something started to shift though. Reich was a HUGE part of the start of my disenchantment- and I was 100% thrilled when we hired him so this isn't rear view mirror shit.
It didn't take long to see that Frank was just not the right guy, that he was so fucking focused on this cerebral winning, this outthinking the other side bullshit, that the team was floundering. It was the 2021 retention of him despite him clearly being at the root of the team faltering, that's where I couldn't stand him- and I get there's the whole Jim, them tied together thing, etc... Nonetheless, as the GM his job is to see the coach is the problem and to remedy it. Then the debacle with Saturday and what I still consider to be the ultimate act of cowardice of not stepping down when it seemed very clear that Jim was saying "you suck, so I am taking control".
After that, man fuck this guy. Steichen, yep, again, very high on the hire. However, what I see now is basically just a repeat of the same thing. The team is mentally soft, the coach is not a real leader, the focus is on skills and measurements, and schemes, and the team is not really much of a team vs just a collection of guys that play football on Sundays and collect checks.
I can't stand what I perceive to be just a general overall acceptance of mid, from the very top to the very last roster spot, they seem to be pretty ok with just being a middle of the pack org- and that sucks!